


Spectral

by Katieee



Series: Shepard meets Thedas [2]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: (hopefully), ALL THE ANGST, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Crossover, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, F/M, Friendship, Heavy Angst, Psychological Trauma, Rite of Tranquility, Slow Burn, THAT BEING SAID
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-18
Updated: 2019-03-21
Packaged: 2019-04-04 04:52:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 13,794
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14012571
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Katieee/pseuds/Katieee
Summary: There was one mage in the Gallows who had never been like the others; she was loud, defiant, and she flirtedconstantlywith the Knight-Captain. Really, there was only one thing Meredith could do about her.And though Cullen had promised to kill Shepard if she was ever made Tranquil, keeping that vow turned out to be a lot more difficult than he'd expected.(An angst-filled AU ofThe Two Commanders, in which Shepard is made Tranquil right before the explosion at Kirkwall.)





	1. Tranquility

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! My brain decided to do a terrible thing and ask 'but what if Shep got made Tranquil?' - because, let's face it, she was pretty lucky the Chantry exploded when it did. So now this has happened! Sorry!
> 
> This story branches from [The Two Commanders](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10052990/chapters/22399619) at the point where Shepard kills a group of Templars who have themselves been murdering mages. That work isn't required reading - but [chapter fifteen](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10052990/chapters/23680707) will give you a clearer idea of the events for which Shepard was made Tranquil, if you're curious. 
> 
> (Shepard is a biotic rather than a mage but, as established in Promise of Destruction, non-mages can also be made Tranquil.)

When Cullen finally rebelled from his Knight-Commander, it was not with his sword raised. It had started before that, unconscious at first; small acts of dissent he’d rationalised as necessities to protect both him and the mage he’d grown close to. Hiding her from a patrol, covering up her indiscretions, ignoring her flagrant disregard of the Circle’s rules. Sitting with her under the stars. He was halfway along his new path before he realised he’d taken a wrong turn - or, perhaps, the right one - and when he committed to pushing onward it was with trepidation, and uncertainty, and no small amount of courage. 

The only problem was, it came a day too late.

The last time he saw Shepard as _Shepard_ , it had only been in passing. She was still furious from the warehouse; her eyes flashed as she passed him in the corridor, emphatically glaring through him rather than at him. And he wanted to stop her - to tell her he was sorry, and she was right - but he couldn’t; Meredith walked beside him, her face hardening near the apostate she loathed so much. Her phylactery weighed heavily next to his heart, and for a wild moment he was sure the Knight-Commander would see it glowing in his breast pocket - but she merely scowled, and complained loudly about unharrowed mages being allowed to walk through the Gallows unsupervised.

In hindsight, it had been a taunt. 

The following day he approached Shepard in the library, armed with her phylactery hidden in a hollowed-out book. He pushed the tome underneath her arm as he made a pretence of browsing the shelves next to her, and out of the corner of his eye he could see her regarding the cover in confusion.

“Did you need help returning this, Knight-Captain?”

“Look later,” he urged, his voice barely a whisper as he picked a random book from a shelf. “Alone.”

“But Apprentices aren’t permitted to take books from the library.”

“Damnit, Shepard; just—”

He turned to look at her, and when he did it wasn’t her sunburst-scorched forehead which gave her away; it was her eyes. It had always been her eyes. Before the magic, before she’d opened her mouth and never stopped talking, her gaze had met his across a battlefield, and even half-dead from blood loss her eyes had taken his breath away. They were ferocious, and endless, and when she laughed they illuminated his otherwise bleak existence - but now they were merely empty, devoid of all life and emotion and everything which had made her… _her_.

And it _hurt_ , far more than it ought to - far more than it ever had before. But already the world seemed like a darker place for the loss of her fire.

“You seem troubled, Knight-Captain,” she said, her voice - Maker, her _voice_ \- impassive in a way she’d never been, the hollowness in her tone echoing through the cavern which had been gouged into his chest. “My new existence unsettles you. That seems to be most people’s response to Tranquility.”

“ _Shepard_ …”

Her name was all he could say; his voice cracked on that word alone, and he knew it would break with any further utterance. That _he_ would break, surrounded by mages and Templars alike, overcome by his grief at having lost the only person he cared for. Grief, and guilt. For it was all his fault; he’d condemned her to the Circle even knowing her as he did, knowing in his gut she was the least suitable mage for the Gallows. But it had been his duty, and he’d ignored the voice which had whispered from the back of his mind to let her go. Now that voice _roared_ , screaming its hatred at him for his immovability - and it was no less than he deserved for having destroyed her.

He wished he’d never met her.

He swallowed, forcing back the bile which had risen in his throat as he pulled his book from her grasp; she didn’t resist him - of _course_ she didn’t resist - her arms falling weakly to her sides as she merely blinked at him. “Forgive me,” he muttered, tearing his eyes away from her as he stormed from the library, and though he knew those he passed were whispering about him he couldn’t hear them for the blood rushing in his ears.

In his quarters he hurled his book against the wall, and as her phylactery shattered on the ground a single sob tore from his throat. And when he scrunched his eyes shut all he saw were hers, vacant and haunting, a cruel injustice for a woman so much better than him.

She’d been obstinate and incorrigible and a relentless pain in the ass, and the nearest thing to a friend he’d had in the Gallows. And now she was gone.

\---

“You made her Tranquil.”

It was an accusation more than a statement; he clenched his trembling hands into fists as he stood before his Knight-Commander, and he wasn’t sure whether they shook from grief or rage. Both, maybe. Meredith’s eyes were just as void of emotion as Shepard’s had been, blue ice no warmer than stony brown, but there was a contempt in her tone which set her apart from what she’d created.

“She murdered five Templars.”

“Then you should have killed her. Not turned her into… _that_.”

Meredith’s face hardened, and he realised the frigidity in her gaze was not disregard; it was barely-contained fury. “You would have us become them? They are the ones who give themselves over to blood magic and slay all in their path. We are not mindless killers!”

Years ago he might have believed those words, and his Knight-Commander’s conviction in them. But that was before Shepard had saved his life; before Hawke had argued with him on oppression. Before Meredith’s paranoia had overtaken rationality. And it was dangerous to provoke her, but in that moment he couldn’t care less about her reaction. “Then why have you sent for the Rite of Annulment?”

Her eyes widened infinitesimally, and he almost thought he saw shame there - but then she shook her head, and her duty was all that remained. “The Rite remains a last resort,” she said, more quietly now. “We are not yet at that point, but I do not think we are far off. As for Shepard, Tranquility protects her from her magic as much as it does all those within the Gallows - and it is a mercy she did not deserve.”

“The mages Alrik forced into Tranquility would not call it a protection, nor a mercy.”

The small sliver of softness Meredith had shown vanished with that sentence; her voice turned hard once more, one hand pressed against her desk in a fist. “Alrik is dead - by a mage’s hand, I might add. His motivations might have been corrupt, but I am beginning to think his solution wasn’t altogether unreasonable. It is our responsibility to protect this city at all costs, no matter what our own… personal feelings for any one mage might be.”

She forced the words from her lips as though they physically repulsed her, and all at once he knew the real reason for Shepard’s Tranquility. “You did this because I— because she…”

He faltered, unable to find the correct way to describe what his relationship with Shepard had been. _Friends_ seemed like a vast oversimplification, one which she surely would have scorned if she still possessed the capacity to do so - and besides, he didn’t have the right to refer to her as such anymore. Not after what they’d done to her. But anything else - admitting that he admired her, that he cared for her, that she was the only person in Kirkwall who mattered to him - felt like confessing a sin to his Knight-Commander. 

And it wasn’t a sin. She was just a mage who he’d liked; there was no shame in that.

“I did this because she killed my men,” Meredith said before he could straighten his thoughts. “And because you tried to cover it up.”

“Those men—”

“Their actions do not excuse hers - or yours,” she cut off his protestation. “ _You_ are lucky not to be out on the street with Samson, but for all your past loyalty I will give you one warning: you are either with us or against us. We cannot afford to falter or be lenient with them; I thought you had learnt that in Ferelden.”

He almost, _almost_ , threw it all away right then; her invocation of the horrors of Kinloch - horrors she’d used to her own advantage for years - sent a wave of anger coursing through him, the irrepressible memories of blood and broken bodies flashing across his mind. But the only thing worse than staying was turning to the streets as another lyrium-beggar, another Samson, leaving those who remained in the Gallows to fend for themselves against the woman he was now certain was a tyrant.

And Maker only knew what would happen to Shepard without him there.

“Is there anything else you require, Knight-Commander?” he said in the calmest voice he could manage, though it still wavered with the fury he couldn’t quite suppress.

“Not currently, Knight-Captain. Get some rest; you’ve had a trying day.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Feel free to yell at me [on tumblr](https://agentkatie.tumblr.com/) for putting my babies through this.


	2. Annulment

Two days later, Kirkwall burned.

His home was once again consumed by death and destruction, the bodies of both his charges and colleagues strewn through the streets. The Rite was issued, and at first he followed, his need for order pushing back the nagging sense of _wrongness_. It took Hawke, the eternal joker for once turned serious, to wake him from his haze of subservience, and as he turned against Meredith it was the image of Shepard which spurred him on.

He almost forgot her as he fought on through fire and fear, which was undoubtedly for the best; if he stopped for a moment to consider her vulnerability amongst the carnage, if he _faltered_ , it would ruin both him and those who now looked to him for leadership. And though he revoked the Rite, and ordered his men to stop fighting and start helping the mages, he knew it would be too late for her; purged of her power and her drive, she had no protection against the horrors which now stalked the Gallows. 

And a small, cowardly part of him took solace in the fact that if she died, he wouldn’t have to fulfil the promise which had tormented him.

It wasn’t until much later that he spotted a flash of crimson hair across the Gallows, darting around the broken walls and crumbling pillars which were all that remained of their home - and for a moment he thought she was finally launching her escape, running from the cage he’d confined her to. But then she looked at him, barren eyes forcing him to remember what she was now, and though his bones ached and his muscles screamed and his lip was split open _that_ was the most painful thing he’d endured since the battle had begun.

“Knight-Captain. What’s the situation?”

“Shepard,” he said as he closed the distance between them. “It’s not safe out here. You need to get…” he trailed off, unsure what to suggest because nowhere was safe; demons roamed where fire didn’t, and despite his commands Templar and mage still fought on every corner.

“There were fires in the living quarters,” she said, her brilliant mind able to read him even now. “I organised the Tranquil to put them out; there were a few casualties, but not many. The children are safe in the Western wing; one of your former Templars agreed to guard them for me.”

“Why?” he asked, unable to understand how she could still be so _brave_ even when ripped from herself. “Why would you do that?”

She tilted her head to one side, as though she didn’t quite understand the question. “They’re children. It makes sense to protect those who have the longest to live.”

It wouldn’t have made sense to many; self-preservation was the default human instinct, the innate state of being not even Tranquility could break. But she was different. She’d allowed him to live when he’d threatened her freedom; she’d killed those Templars to save others rather than herself. Selflessness prevailed in the absence of emotion, and though Tranquility had stripped her of her passion it hadn’t touched her unshakable sense of what was _right_.

That this small part of her remained, even when all else had been extinguished, somehow made her fate even worse.

“Stay with me,” he urged, because he knew of nowhere safer than his side. “Keep watch for demons.”

She nodded, and he wondered if she would have agreed so readily before; if she would have seen his actions as just and fought alongside him, mage and Templar for once stood side by side against the burgeoning darkness. And as he watched her turn from him, scanning their ravaged city for any further foes, he fancied he knew the answer - that she would have fought to protect those who remained with all her might, and that she would have never let him hear the end of it.

\---

He almost didn’t notice when she picked up a weapon; she did it so calmly, so easily, that it took a moment to register just how unnatural her action was. Tranquil didn’t fight; they ran, and hid, defending themselves from enemies but never attacking. She, as ever, was an anomaly.

He almost wished Meredith were still alive, so he could see her face as a Tranquil appraised a dagger.

“What are you doing?”

“It’s foolish not to be armed at a time like this,” she told him, unfastening a belt from a nearby body and hooking her newfound daggers onto it.

“But you _can’t_ fight, not now you’re…”

He faltered, because calling her Tranquil to her face somehow seemed insensitive, regardless of whether or not she could be hurt by it. “I should still be able to perform adequately in combat, and I would rather not die here,” she said as she buckled her looted belt around her waist. “My best chance of survival comes from arming myself.”

In his mind’s eye she smirked at him, and said _don’t worry, Rutherford; I probably won’t stab you in the back_.

But there was no smirk, not even the flicker of a smile; she simply pressed on, subdued and silent as they traversed their ruined streets. Once he’d prayed to the Maker that she would just stop talking; now he yearned for her to say something, _anything_ , so he could pretend for a moment they were beyond Kirkwall’s chains again. And it was not just the eradication of laughter, nor the muzzle on that sharp tongue of hers. The graceful artistry with which she’d slain a horde of Qunari had been crushed too; her battle-dance had slowed to a passionless march, rote strikes effective yet… boring. Reactive rather than proactive, her weapons only readied once her foe had made their move.

Though that wasn’t entirely out of character. Had she been more willing to raise her blade before, he’d be dead, and she much better off for it. That mercy had cost her everything.

So he watched her back, as if protecting her now would make up for all the times he had not; he shielded her from stray fireballs, felled demons the moment they clawed in her direction. Ordered his men not to turn their swords on her. And he briefly wondered why he was going to such lengths for her safety; her survival through this horror only ensured her death at his hands later, and would he really be able to do that? Keep a promise he’d made without thinking, before he’d known just how important her existence was to him?

He knew, even as he fought to protect her, there was a distinct chance he wouldn’t be able to keep his promise; that his sword-hand would tremble when met with her innocent, unfeeling gaze. That he would retreat to cowardice once more, and she yet again would suffer because of him. What would become of her then, without a Circle or her own sense as a shield against those who would choose to exploit her? What would _he_ do, as the life he’d known crumbled around him?

Whatever choice he might make, he couldn’t afford to dwell on it now. Now he could only focus on killing his enemies; later, once the battle was over, he would consider the implications of slaying his only friend.


	3. Responsibility

Samson. He was the former Templar Shepard had enlisted to protect their mage children. As the battle slowed and they returned to what remained of the Gallows, Samson stood proudly amongst the wreckage, too-big armour and hollow cheeks and the look of a man who’d long seen this day coming. He too had a Tranquil by his side, the mage whose friendship had seen him thrown from the Order a lifetime ago, but when they spoke there was neither rage nor resentment there; instead he turned soft, face clouding with concern as he scanned the young man’s features for injuries, a sliver of the Templar he’d once been breaking through the dirt and regret. 

There was none of that softness for Cullen. He greeted Shepard with a gentle hand on the shoulder and a quiet reassurance regarding those she’d left in his care, but with Cullen his words turned hard and cold, contempt clear in his intonation of _Knight-Captain_. Still he offered his help, but his deference was underwritten by scorn, and he refused to part with Maddox for any task assigned to him. Cullen allowed it, for he kept his own shadow too close to argue otherwise.

With their own forces decimated, Kirkwall turned to Starkhaven for relief. Their brothers from the north arrived just as Cullen thought all hope was lost, bolstering both their numbers and morale; their leader, a Knight-Captain named Rylen, proved a voice of reason amongst the madness, facing the chaos head-on with iron will and grim humour. And there was no retribution in their aid, no Annulment for those mages who remained in the city as allies; Rylen hesitated for only a moment at the sight of a Tranquil armed with daggers, before shrugging and muttering that they needed all the help they could get. 

It took five days to extinguish the fires. The last vestiges of battle, a week. Soon after they stopped finding survivors, each body pulled from the ruins long since lost to them, and flames quickly rose again on the pyres of those he’d failed. Sleep became a hypothetical construct, one which Cullen both yearned for and was desperate to avoid; when forced to rest the Fade suffocated him, abandoning him to shades and wraiths and the echoes of a laugh he’d never hear again. Through it all, Shepard remained by his side. And he knew it was merely a logical decision - that allying with the de facto leader of the Templars was an act of self-preservation - but he pretended, at his weakest, it was more than that; that she wanted to be there, that she chose to be beside him. That she was still _her_.

But she wasn’t; a fact which was never clearer than when she interacted with the children of the Gallows. She’d wanted to protect them - she’d saved them - but the fierce warmth with which she’d once guarded Agata had shifted to detached pragmatism. The little mage they’d travelled with now watched Shepard in silent sorrow; occasionally trying, as only children could, to bring her back with broken pleas and clutching hands. She’d blamed Cullen, of course; she’d screamed at him, so loudly other Templars had come rushing to his aid, weapons half-drawn at the sight of a sobbing child and their stone-faced leader. 

It had to be stone, because he couldn’t afford to show them anything else. 

“What do you plan to do with her?” Samson asked, in the quiet, as Shepard and Maddox inventoried their dwindling supplies; it was as though he knew what she’d begged of him, forcing him to remember the promise he was breaking. Pushing him from indecision.

“Before, she asked…” Cullen began, swallowing to clear the ever-present lump in his throat. “She said if this ever happened, she wanted to— wanted me to…”

“The woman who asked you that is dead already. Don’t mistake this one for her.”

His words were tinged with threat, with _accusation_ , and anger itched under Cullen’s skin. “What about Maddox, then?” he shot back. “What do you plan to _do_ with him?”

“Keep him with me,” Samson shrugged. “Keep him safe. I owe him that much. He’s my responsibility, whatever happens next.”

 _Responsibility_. She was his now; that was without doubt. In the absence of capacity she needed _someone_ to watch out for her, to act as a guardian against all who would choose to exploit her, and he trusted no-one else to take on that role. It never occurred to him to just… leave her, to abandon her with the other lost souls of Kirkwall. He either kept the promise of a woman who no longer cared for it, or kept her with him, a permanent reminder of all his failings. Of all he’d lost, through cowardice and weakness.

And all she’d lost, too.

“I made a promise,” he muttered, more to himself than to Samson.

“You’ve made a lot of promises. Look where they’ve gotten you,” Samson replied.

\---

“You’ve been talking with Samson about the merits of killing me.”

It was the first conversation she’d started in weeks; the words came so unexpectedly that Cullen choked on his stew, coughing to clear his throat of his measly rations. “I once asked you to kill me if I became Tranquil,” she continued, undeterred by his violent reaction. “That you haven’t done it yet suggests… conflict.”

He didn’t understand what she was saying, or why; her voice was unnaturally calm, as though discussing the weather rather than the end of her life. “Are you asking me to kill you now?”

“No.”

“Then what are you asking me?” he demanded, words slightly too loud in his desperation to understand her. “What do you want?”

“Nothing,” she shrugged, her attention returning to her own meal; his hand moved of its own volition, grabbing hold of her wrist as she reached for her fork.

“But how do you _feel_?” he asked, _begged_ , with a grasp too tight for gauntlets on bare skin. “Being like this, not being…” _You_ , was how he wanted to finish his sentence, but saying it to her felt cruel; with a groan he dropped her wrist, shame prickling his neck for both his outburst and the indentations left behind on her flesh.

“I don’t feel; you know that,” she told him, and the lack of bitterness in those words made them all the more painful. “Before, I would have been distressed by this - furious, maybe. But I can’t be those things anymore, and I don’t mind how I am now. I’m content, and living is preferable to dying.”

“Content,” he echoed. “But not happy.”

“I wasn’t happy before,” she mused. “I was always sad, actually. Everything used to hurt so much more, but now when I sleep I just sleep. Life is simpler. Quiet.”

“You always hated the quiet.”

She shrugged once more, and his brow furrowed as she focused on her unfinished meal. She’d never seemed sad before. What he remembered most - what he chose to remember - was her smile, but even then he knew she’d frequently been frustrated and angry, fighting him with quick wit and a glare he was sure some days would kill him. But _sad_ … sad just seemed like too defeated an emotion for her. 

Perhaps that was the point; perhaps Commander Shepard, for all her bravado, had been just as broken as him. Perhaps that was what had drawn them together, as allies if not friends.

And though Commander Shepard no longer existed, this Shepard still did. She lived, and wanted to live; she could help, and would have wanted to help. In that moment, as he finally made his decision, those were the rationalisations he made as he belligerently ignored the truth; that with one Shepard already dead because of him, his heart was too heavy to kill another.

“This is not an order,” he began, choosing his words with great care. “But if you stay with me, I will ensure your safety. You do not have to work; you don’t have to do anything. But I’ll make sure you have food, shelter - anything you want,” he said, voice breaking on that word because he knew she didn’t _want_ anymore. “Anything you need. Always.”

“I will stay,” she nodded. “I see no reason to leave. But I can be useful. If you require my assistance, you only need ask.”

“I do not wish to use you, Shepard,” he said softly, hoping beyond all hope she knew that to be true.

“Then whatever you wish, Knight-Captain. I shall follow.”

In the deepest recesses of his mind, a voice whispered forth of his selfishness, warning him on the pain of the path he’d carved for the both of them. _Coward_ , it hissed, and then louder: _liar_. And though he could still change his mind, he knew he would not; he’d given in, and condemned them both. Now all he could do was continue, and hope that the Maker would not condemn him for his weakness.


	4. Seeker

And so follow Shepard did. When his fellow Templars began to address him as Knight-Commander, she followed, and called him the same. When the few remaining mages fled to the north, she remained, barely acknowledging the departure of Agata and the other children she’d saved. As some semblance of order returned to Kirkwall, she stood by him, tackling each new task with unflinching focus.

And as months gave way to years, the parts of her which had been so quintessentially _Shepard_ faded in Cullen’s memory. The knowledge of who she’d been had once raged at the forefront of his conscience, but now it merely whispered; a soft impression, lingering like the inescapable tendrils of the Fade on a just-woken mind, holding at the edges but not quite tangible. With each dose of lyrium it grew cloudier. At first it was a mercy, to look on her without being consumed by guilt and grief; all too soon he realised it was a punishment, forgetting the only person who’d made him feel… _something_. But now when she looked at him, brown eyes silent and cold, he could no longer visualise the mischievous glint which had once worried him, and he remembered a story about a race of blue women but couldn’t recall the _way_ she said it, the sheer vibrancy that had once radiated from her blurred and fuzzy and just out of his reach.

Perhaps a day would come when he didn’t remember her at all.

But for now, Shepard assisted him. It was not without shame on his part; the sense that he was exploiting her crept on him with every report she submitted, with every late night she spent writing letters of requisition to rebuild their crumbling city. The alternative - her sitting silently as she watched him work - was almost unbearable, and he truly believed she would have wanted to help; the Shepard he had known had championed goodness and justice, and though he’d been neither in a very long time he was _trying_ to do better now. He hoped, if she could feel as she saw him, that she was would have stayed regardless.

The Seekers arrival in town sent a wave of commotion rippling through Kirkwall, disturbing the hard-won calmness with speculation and doubt. They sought the Champion who had long since vanished, questioning those associates who still remained in the city; the Guard-Captain who kept Kirkwall in check alongside Cullen, the dwarf who now drank alone in the Hanged Man each night. And then him. The Right Hand of the Divine was the one who came to him, questioning him on Hawke and that fateful final battle; the Left Hand stood beside her, faintly familiar but impossible to place. It wasn’t until later he realised where he’d seen her, amongst the bodies of long-dead friends and clawing demons he’d never escape, and though she been impassive and polite he knew she’d recognised him too. 

He hoped to avoid the two women after that, but the Maker had different ideas; Seeker Pentaghast found him again not long after, with a proposition and a chance to start afresh. What she saw in him he didn’t know, and what she offered was more than he deserved, but it woke something inside him which had long been absent; drive, and hope, and a want for a future beyond Kirkwall’s chains.

“The Seeker has offered me a new role,” he told Shepard over their nightly debrief. “She is forming an alliance to end the Mage-Templar War; she wishes me to oversee any military activity.”

“I see,” Shepard said, dispassionate as ever as she continue to scan over reports.

“It would mean leaving Kirkwall,” he continued. “Leaving the Templar Order.”

“I see.”

“What do you think I should do?” he asked when she offered nothing further; she looked up, face blank and unfeeling in the wake of his indecision.

“That depends on your motivation. What is it you want?”

“I want…” he began, then sighed, unsure how to quite express himself. He wanted to feel as though his life was his again; he wanted a reason to wake up in the morning other than the all-consuming duty which forced him forward. He wanted not to hate the man he saw in the mirror; he wanted to be whatever Seeker Pentaghast had seen in him. “To be better than I am,” he said eventually, with a shrug and a shake of his head.

“There would undoubtedly be more room for personal growth within the Seeker’s alliance.”

“I do not mean in skill. I mean…”

“Ah. Redemption,” she surmised, pensive as she considered her advice. “Staying in Kirkwall would allow you to atone for any perceived wrongs in this city directly, but there isn’t much more you can accomplish here. This Seeker offers you the chance to help others more broadly - but there’s more risk. It may all come to nothing.”

Her words were rational and well-considered, and nothing more than he’d already determined, logical yet lacking the passion needed to make such a decision. And he knew the question was pointless, but he just couldn’t help but ask—

“What would you do?”

For a moment, he could almost convince himself her dead-eyed stare was one of exasperation; that her slow blink was one of frustration that, even now, he was asking questions she could no longer hope to answer. “I’m not you,” she told him. “It doesn’t matter to me.” She paused, her brow furrowing a fraction. “Would I go with you?”

“Of course,” he said quickly, though he’d discussed nothing of the sort with the Seeker. “If— if you want…”

“Staying here without an ally would be unwise. It’s very unlikely that I’ll find Liara. Remaining with you is the best choice for me.”

She’d mentioned Liara only a handful of times over the past few years, her friend a sidenote where once she’d been her primary concern; he’d offered to look for her once, but she’d merely shrugged and said _whatever you think best_. A blue woman, like in the stories she’d once told, shouldn’t have been hard to find, but all his enquiries had proved fruitless, and soon she’d become forgotten amongst the buzz of an imperilled city.

“I can try to look for her again,” he said softly. “I know we found nothing before, but things are more settled now.”

“She’s most likely dead; trying to find her would be a waste of resources. Besides, I don’t think she would be happy to see me as I am now.”

There was truth in what she said; a blue woman was unlikely to survive much longer than a Tranquil out in the world without an ally. But her indifference made him drop the subject, because hearing her talk in such a way made his heart ache. “Then I will speak to Seeker Pentaghast about joining her cause,” he said, with a nod to convince himself more than her of their new path. “With a bit of luck, we may not be in Kirkwall for much longer.”

\---

At first glance, Seeker Cassandra was everything Cullen had assumed a Seeker would be; sharp and unrelenting, a hard manner and an even harder frown. Her additional titles - the Right Hand, the Hero of Orlais - only added to his apprehension, their first meeting filled with trepidation and uncertainty. When she spoke however, there was something beyond sternness; a passion, a determination to do what was right regardless of the consequences, with very little care for what others might think of her.

She reminded him a little of Shepard, but without the smile. 

“Have you made your choice, Knight-Commander?” she asked when he returned with his answer.

“Yes,” he nodded, drawing himself taller in a bid to seem immovable. “I will join you - but I have one condition.” She merely arched an eyebrow at him, and he ploughed ahead with his rehearsed speech. “There is a woman here. Shepard. I would ask that she accompanies me. She has an exceptional talent for military tactics and preparedness; I believe she would be an asset to your cause.”

Much to his surprise, the Seeker’s countenance softened, her brow smoothing and a small smile working its way to the corners of her lips. “Your lover, I assume?”

“I— no!” he spluttered, the heat creeping to his cheeks now an unfamiliar sensation; strangely nostalgic and not altogether unwanted, because at least it was _something_. “She is a mage - a Tranquil. And she is my responsibility.”

“Ah,” she said, her hardness returning once more. “A Templar accompanied by a Tranquil may give the wrong impression of our organisation. We would not wish mages to think we are enslaving them.”

“This is my only condition, and it is non-negotiable,” he maintained, folding his arms across his chest. “I will not join you without her.”

She considered him for a long moment, stern face puckering in scrutiny. “Why was she made Tranquil?”

“Many mages were made Tranquil here,” he told her, though the acknowledgement made shame prickle at the base of his neck. “Few with good reason.”

“And what was hers?”

That was a more complicated question than it should have been, the official reason not being the true reason and neither option representing them well. “She killed several Templars.” Unsurprisingly, the hard lines of the Seeker’s face contort into an even deeper scowl at his admission, an unfair judgement of actions he didn’t have the energy to explain.

“And you still protect her?”

“It was not without due cause.”

He expected her to say no then, to rescind her offer and leave Kirkwall without him - but instead she nodded, the tension in her body relaxing an inch. “May I meet her?”

It was not a question but a requirement, and though Cullen knew it was necessary it still made him nervous; nervous for how Cassandra would treat her, and what she would think of him for it. There was no room in the Templar writ for compassion, only duty; the protection of one vulnerable mage meant nothing if it compromised their resolve. Yet Cassandra was strangely gentle, tentative in her questioning, a pity in her eyes bordering on sorrow when Shepard welcomed her in her monotonous, unfeeling voice.

“Do you wish to join our cause?” Cassandra asked softly, and though it was a question she had no true answer to Cullen appreciated it all the same.

“I will go where the Knight-Commander goes, if I’m permitted.”

“Why follow him?”

He would have liked to hear her say she followed because it was right; that she believed in the path he’d chosen, and that she believed in him. But she never would have given that response, even before; instead she would have cracked a joke, or thoroughly embarrassed him with heavy-handed flirtation. That was far beyond her now. “Humans survive better in groups,” was her explanation, well-reasoned and meaningless to him. “And I have no-one else.”

Cassandra sighed, as though she too was disappointed by the answer. “This does not feel right, Knight-Commander.”

“Would you rather leave her behind?” Cullen snapped, immediately defensive of the woman who needed him. “Allow her to fend for herself in this place? She would not survive the week.”

“My technique isn’t what it once was, but I can still perform adequately in combat,” Shepard countered. “I would be safer with you, but if the Seeker does not wish for me to join you, I wouldn’t be helpless.”

She could still fight, that was true, but the fundamentals of living were beyond her; though he regularly neglected food and sleep she was far worse, working for hours without respite until he prompted her to rest. And if her work was taken away, what would become of her? A shadow haunting a broken city, stripped of the tasks which formed her entire existence, lost and alone and doomed?

“It is not a case of not wanting you,” Cassandra told her. “But rather wanting what is best for you. Perhaps to stay in Kirkwall, with one of the Knight-Commander’s friends—”

“I have only ever had one friend in this city,” Cullen said firmly. “And I will not turn my back on her now.”

The Seeker sighed again, with a shake of her head this time, a wry smile twisting her lips. “Non-negotiable,” she echoed his previous words. “Very well; we sail at dawn. Pack up what you need - the journey is long, so ensure you have all the lyrium you require to—”

“No,” he said quickly, throwing himself over that final hurdle he’d been contemplating for too long. “No. If I am to leave the Templars, I will leave all of it. I will not be bound to the Order any longer.”

“It will be difficult. Painful.”

He expected refusal; harsh words to reinforce his commitment to the Order, a demand of the reasoning behind his decision. He expected disappointment, anger, _commands_. He had not asked for permission, and she hadn’t given it, yet her caution came with a silent note of acceptance; a denotation that the Seeker’s cause would not be the Order, and that she was more than Meredith. A light at the end of the tunnel he’d thought infinite.

“Lyrium withdrawal has killed Templars before now,” Shepard commented idly. “It’s a risk.”

“I know,” he said, an acknowledgement of both women’s warnings. “But I must try. I do not want to compromise your cause, but—”

“I will keep an eye on your progress,” Cassandra cut him off, quick to temper his concerns. “If required, I will find a replacement. But I hope— well.” She shrugged, turning once more to sternness when the words she searched for eluded her. “Make sure to visit an apothecary before we leave. A trip across the Waking Sea in the throes of lyrium withdrawal will not be a pleasant one.”

She left then, returning to her own rooms in preparation for departure; as always Shepard remained by his side, expression almost alive as she watched him with something close to confusion. “You don’t approve,” he surmised.

“I just don’t understand. You might die.”

“I know. But…”

He trailed off, lost for words yet again in the face of her blunt pragmatism. For she could never comprehend how the chain around his neck tightened with each dose, nor how each draught made _Cullen_ slip further from his reach. And whilst with lyrium he could almost repress the demons of Kinloch and Kirkwall - could almost forget the woman who had existed before her - he didn’t want to forget anymore; perhaps facing it all, the abominations and the fear and his own miserable failures, would mean he could start to heal, and start to feel something other than sorrow and resentment again. And perhaps it would mean that, one day, he would do right by her.

“I don’t want to lose more of myself than I already have,” was the answer he gave - not adding that he refused to lose more of her, either.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! I'm still alive! I'm sorry for the lack of updates over April - life got very busy - but I'm hoping to update more over May (this and TTC!). Thanks for sticking with me <3


	5. Revelations

The journey across the Waking Sea was worse still than Cullen had imagined. In cramped confinement below deck, all which had plagued him on his outward journey years ago now crashed back down on him, intensified in the absence of lyrium; perpetual nausea compounded intractable headaches, leaving him sweating and shaking and broken. Once, to his shame, he prayed for the end.

And, to his greater shame, Shepard tended him.

He hadn’t asked her to; indeed, he’d pushed her away when she’d started, muttering feebly for her to leave him alone in his toil. But even in Tranquility, Shepard remained somewhat unusual. Without that passion so inextricably woven in the fabric of her personality, her already-sharp mind turned unflinchingly logical - and, if logic dictated the best path was against Cullen’s wishes, she followed it. That she still thought she knew better than him was as frustrating as it was heartrending - and yet he allowed it, because in this little way it still felt like he was battling _her_. That _she_ was still with him.

At the point he thought he could endure no more, the tide turned, his symptoms receding to a residual - but manageable - hum beneath the surface of his skin; head aching but no longer pounding, tremors almost-controllable with hands clenched in fists. Only the nausea persisted, the swaying of their ship providing no relief from the churning in his gut - but at least now he could venture above deck, the sea air providing brief moments of respite from the suffocation he faced below.

It was hard to avoid his travelling companions, no matter how much he wished to. Seeker Cassandra enquired regularly about his wellbeing, as did Sister Leliana; their prisoner, the dwarf who’d once trailed after Hawke, seemed set on conning him into a game of cards. Only Shepard remained silent in his company, and though long accustomed to it he still yearned for the days when she wasn’t; when she’d joked and mocked and he’d felt _something_ other than the gut-gnawing crave for lyrium.

“You seem better,” Cassandra commented one evening, as the pair worked by candlelight over their plans. “Shepard took good care of you, whilst you were…”

“I asked her not to.”

“But not ordered.” It felt like an accusation, yet further rebuke did not come; instead Cassandra spoke softly, almost sadly, and somehow that was worse. “She seems very devoted to you.”

The quickening of his heart was foolish, and futile, for despite what he pretended in weakness such loyalty was beyond her now. “My survival is intrinsically linked to hers; it is nothing more than that.”

“Do you wish it was?”

“It can’t be. What I wish hardly matters.” 

She was silent then, his reticence hindering conversation - and, he realised, himself. For when she asked about Shepard there was merely curiosity; no disapproval, nor censure, as was all he had faced with the Templars. She asked simply to know; to know him better, and Shepard too.

He’d only had one friend in Kirkwall. But perhaps beyond those chains was the chance for more.

“Yes,” he spoke again, quietly now, allowing the Seeker to see for the first time the remorse and regret in his soul. “I wish I could know whether she would approve of all this.”

“Why her?” she asked, and then, whilst he struggled to form his answer; “the dwarf’s book - it never mentioned her. It mentioned _you_ , frequently, but you did not seem a man who would have such firm friends amongst mages.”

And the truth was he wasn’t, and never did have; not even Shepard, for all her familiarity and ease. His isolation had been simple, and necessary - and had formed the basis of her ruin.

“All I felt for years was anger,” he admitted, the confession a lance on the wound he’d been convinced could not heal. “Fear. And then I met Shepard, and she reminded me mages are not just the power they yield. She was… funny. And irritating. And a far better person than I.” Whether it was pity or empathy in the Seeker’s eyes, he couldn’t bring himself to face it; he glowered down at his reports, giving voice to the guilt which clawed worse than demons, sharper still in the absence of lyrium. “I brought her back to the Circle; it is my fault she’s Tranquil.”

“You did not wield the Brand.”

“I may as well have. The last thing I said to her was…” He hesitated, reluctant to reveal his final shame - but he’d started now, and all he could do was continue. “Was that I would never help her again. That I’d paid my debt to her, and I would not shield her from the Templars any longer. And now…”

Now she was lost forever, a shadow of what once was; irretrievable, empty, and silent, even as she followed his word. And he’d long accepted it, long resigned to the gradual fade each passing day wrought to the woman who’d once been; yet when he spoke of her as her it almost felt like she wasn’t entirely gone from his side. Almost seemed, if only for a moment, that that fire hadn’t perished after all.

“Whatever happens, we will ensure her safety,” Cassandra told him, a ferocity he’d once seen in Shepard now shining from her eyes. And he nodded, and tried to offer her a smile, despite knowing in his heart it was far too late for that.

\---

With the flick of a dagger and the promise of gold, everything changed.

Their fledgling group was not the only to seek passage out of Kirkwall; others, far more destitute than they, left the Free Marches aboard their vessel, with hopes of a better life across the Waking Sea. The two Hands of the Divine and Kirkwall’s last Knight-Commander should have given thieves pause for thought, but sense could only hold out so long against desperation.

Three knocks roused Cullen from his half-sleep, not on his door but on the wall he shared with the mess hall; he blinked, focusing his mind as a toneless voice seeped through.

“Commander. I require assistance.”

Shepard’s blank plea filled him with far more dread than it should have; he jumped from bed, grabbing his sword before rushing towards her voice, hammering on Cassandra’s door along the way. For whatever it was, there could be nothing good from her call in the middle of the night, from where he’d left her - _thoughtlessly_ \- to continue her work for their cause. Yet what he’d expected - injury, or worse - was nowhere near the reality; a reality as impossible as it was undeniable, robbing breath from his lungs and pouring out anguish in its place.

“That… cannot be,” Cassandra murmured. “How…?”

Cassandra’s reaction was all that told him he hadn’t lost his mind, for the sight of Shepard - bathed in blue, as she had been a lifetime ago, encasing a man with her magic - was beyond the realms of reason, a vision doomed to haunt his lonely recess of the Fade. And for a wild moment, he thought she’d overcome it, had broken free from the Brand on her mind; for of all mages he’d known, surely _she_ was the one who stood a chance of striking through, out of sheer tenacity and spite. But then she spoke, and her voice remained impassive, her jokes still a whisper on the past; eyes empty as she looked at Cassandra for guidance she’d never needed before.

“This man tried to steal from you, Seeker Cassandra. I explained the documents were important, but he didn’t stop. What do you wish to do with him?”

She dropped her magic, and the man fell to his knees gasping for air - and though the thief should have been Cullen’s main concern he just couldn’t keep his eyes off Shepard. “ _How_?” he repeated Cassandra’s question, unsure if he wanted the answer.

“Oh.” She looked at her hands, as if surprised by her own power, before dropping them passively to her sides. “My biotics aren’t shaped by your Fade.”

“What are you talking about?” Cullen snapped, frustration winning out to his shame. “What do you mean, _biotics_?”

“My abilities. They aren’t magic, though I can see how they’d be mistaken as such here. I’m not a mage.” 

The shift was minute and yet earth-shattering, that last weak excuse slipping from his grasp as she laid bare what he’d always known - that she’d never been a danger, and never deserving of _this_. That he’d ravaged a life worth far more than his, and condemned himself in the process.

“Using them in Kirkwall seemed an unnecessary risk,” she continued, as if sensing the well of questions in his mind. “I didn’t wish for people to panic.”

“But— why didn’t you tell me?!”

There was more anger in his question than intended, for somehow that was easier; it always had been, simmering beneath the surface as his cravings now did, visceral and uncomplicated - and inescapable, no matter how much he wished to be different. “I did,” she replied. “You didn’t listen.”

Those simple words - barren and detached as they were - cut through his chest like a knife, because all of a sudden he _remembered_ ; the appeals he’d ignored crashing through the haze of lyrium and time to present themselves fully once more.

_I’m not a mage, I’m a biotic; totally different._

_What you think of as magic - it’s different to what I do._

And, even as he tried to fight it, his response followed right on its heels; echoes entrenched in fear and blindness, unaware of the devastation to follow. _You’re an apostate with dangerous magic, and it’s my duty to stop you._

For that was all he’d been; duty and dedication to a cause he’d once promised his life - and which had taken his life, bit by bit, and everything else human about him. And if it hadn’t been _him_ who’d found her - had it been Thrask, or Keran, or another less broken than him - _Shepard_ might yet still exist; but it _had_ been him, and he’d been nothing more than the armour he’d worn. Why did he think he could be more than that now?

The air was suddenly too close, the walls too near and smothering; without another word he stormed from the cabin, unable to breathe until he reached deck once more. And though the sea air held him back from drowning, it couldn’t suppress the pounding of guilt at the base of his skull; couldn’t hold back the wrongs doomed to follow wherever he went. Couldn’t numb how much he missed her, even now.

“You okay, Curly?”

The voice which broke him from his reverie came from his new prisoner, strangely cheerful just as Shepard had been, and in that moment it was very hard not to resent him. “Aren’t you supposed to be manacled?”

“Where am I going to go, off the side of the ship?” He winced at the dwarf’s joking, too painfully nostalgic to bear; when he spoke again it was softer, with a compassion Cullen hardly deserved. “If it helps, I thought she was a mage too.”

It didn’t help in the slightest, because Varric wasn’t the one who had chained her - he’d _aided_ her, in fact, even as Cullen had lured her into her cage. “I am a _Templar_ ,” Cullen muttered, glaring out across the waves. “I should have seen— it is my duty to protect people, and I _failed_ her.” He winced again, catching himself far too late to matter, his fight to move forward faltering in face of his grief. “Was. Was a Templar.”

“You failed her anyway, with or without magic.”

He snapped his glare to Varric, unwilling to hear what he already knew on another person’s lips. “Is that supposed to help, dwarf?”

“Look, you screwed up; you can’t change that. You can only look forward, and do better, and try to do right by her.” It was far easier said than done, and when Cullen didn’t reply he persisted with an oddly tentative tone. “Do you think this is what’s right by her?”

“There is no alternative,” Cullen said, _lied_ , refusing to acknowledge the choice he’d turned his back on years ago. “All I can do now is protect her.”

“Whatever you say, Curly.”

He left him alone then, with a sigh and a pat of his arm, allowing him to cede back to solitude - the only certainty he had left, comforting in its desolation. And perhaps there would be a time for friendship, companionship, but not now; now he was content to be alone, as he stared out across the endless, starlit sea.


	6. Haven

When they finally docked in Ferelden, it didn’t feel like home; it felt familiar, the climate and the flora brushing Cullen with a faint shiver of nostalgia, but it didn’t feel like _his_. There was no comfort in the buffet of cold wind against his face, nor in the landscapes he’d traversed as a boy, the place he’d once belonged now as foreign as the Free Marches had been when he’d first set foot in Kirkwall. And he knew it shouldn’t hurt, because there hadn’t been a _his_ in a decade, not since the Blight had ravaged his hometown and demons had ravaged his Circle — and yet still he’d hoped, desperately, and foolishly, for somewhere he could finally feel safe.

He wasn’t sure if Haven was that. There was no warmth to the place, neither in temperature nor personality, too few people to breathe life into the town and yet too many for true quiet; its wooden walls did little to hold back the harshness of Fereldan winter, and would do even less against any who put their minds to breaking them. But his trickle of troops, at least, distracted him from his unrest; his days slowly filled with training and meetings, and soon it was only at night that the unease in his chest returned. And he couldn’t quite figure out the root of his worries; perhaps it was fear of the unknown, anxiety for what they still had to face, or perhaps it was the unshakable scold from his conscience for turning his back on the Order.

Or perhaps it was Shepard. 

For she had no real role in this place; the tasks she’d once assumed were slowly stripped from her as their new faction expanded, assigned instead to those considered experts in their fields. Their quartermaster now stockpiled weapons and equipped their soldiers; their Ambassador now wrote petitions and pleas. And Shepard didn’t protest, nor ask for new duties; instead she simply followed, and commented idly how there was not much use in war for a Tranquil.

 _His_ Tranquil. That was what they all called her. Not Shepard, nor the title she’d once insisted upon; she’d ceased to be _Commander_ and was now merely _The Commander’s Tranquil_ , her entire identity consumed by his. She would have hated it even more than he did.

“She is not my _property_ ,” he’d snapped at the blacksmith, when he’d enquired if she needed new armour, and though he knew there was no malice he just couldn’t help the anger that itched under his skin.

They said other things, too. It was only to be expected; not even the Brand could mask her charming splash of freckles, or her beautiful, haunting eyes. The rumours were shut down by the Spymaster as soon as they reached her, but still whisperings remained, passed on by those who couldn’t comprehend why a Templar would keep a Tranquil so closely by his side. 

They didn’t realise his deepest desire was for her to argue with him again.

But those who mattered knew his intentions, and were good to her in turn. Cassandra requested her presence at the War Table more frequently than was required; Leliana ran reconnaissance past her when her own spies would have sufficed. Even Lady Josephine, for what little she knew of Tranquil, included Shepard in her schedule for tea together once a week. It was unnecessary, and they knew that as well as he did — but he appreciated their efforts, all the same.

The days soon blurred into one, distinguishable only by the intensity of his withdrawals, and before he knew it the Conclave was upon them; all their efforts and planning boiling down to one pivotal moment in time. And though the few troops he had he’d trained relentlessly, he prayed they wouldn’t need to pick up their swords; that the war between Templar and Mage would be won by mere words, and no further life would be lost in their seemingly endless struggle for peace.

“It may be useful for one of us to attend the Conclave,” Shepard commented as they pored over their contingency plans.

Cassandra shook her head. “That will not be necessary. The Divine will be able to relay any developments to us in due course.”

“But that may take some time,” Leliana pointed out. “Shepard would be able to return far quicker than—”

“No.” 

Each woman turned to look at Cullen, their expressions ranging from shrewd to curious, and though he’d only spoken to keep her safe he knew that wasn’t enough reason for them. “The mages may take it poorly if we send a— you.”

“I can be discreet.”

“You never used to be.”

He didn’t know what possessed him to say it, what made him forget for the briefest of moments that there would be no witty retort back; tiredness, perhaps, mistaking a counterpoint for the sparring he’d once resented, and now craved. “Forgive me,” he said with a wince. “I did not—”

“Even if I could take offence, I know you didn’t mean it.”

It wouldn’t do to dwell on how different her response would have been in years gone by, and he dared not look at the others for fear of their judgement and pity; instead he remained focused on Shepard, fighting down his misgivings to offer a chance to do… _something_. “Go,” he told her, his struggle with doubt forcing the word out like an order, which hadn’t been what he’d intended at all. “If that is what you wish.”

“It’s what I think is the best strategy. But if you don’t agree—”

“Go,” he repeated, softer now. “There can be no harm in attending.”

\---

There was green, and then there was pain, suffusing through every nerve and fibre and echoing down to her soul, joy and anger and fear and _life_ breathed into her for a beautiful, terrible moment. But then there was running, because there was always running. And then there was silence once more.

\---

An emerald bolt cracked the sky and thundered out across Haven, and Cullen’s first thoughts were of Kirkwall; of that column of red which wrenched the city apart, and the shrieking demons which had spread through the streets like a plague. And that it happened again now, when he stood on the precipice of being more than he was, his future tangible yet just beyond his grasp, made history feel like a landslide he could never hope to outrun.

And then he remembered Shepard. 

Shepard, who had left only that morning for the now-sundered spot on the horizon; Shepard, for whom he’d barely looked up from his papers as he’d bid her farewell. Shepard, who he’d thoughtlessly thrown into danger once more. And there was a part of him which considered it might be a good way to die, that it absolved him of broken promises which still whispered accusations in the silence — but that part was drowned out by panic, and the frantic hammering of his heart.

He didn’t even know why it mattered, for it wasn’t as though she could care anymore; yet even in her absence from herself, she was the only person who meant anything to him. 

_No survivors_ was the first he heard, and then _just one_ , and though the woman pulled from the wreckage could be anyone he couldn’t suppress the hope that it was _her_. And though he wanted to wait for her return, to know one way or the other if fate had struck the blow he could not, the encroaching swarm of demons took precedence; armed with determination and little else, he led the charge against chaos once more, shouting orders to his men as images of Kirkwall and Kinloch flashed at the base of his mind.

He refused to let hopelessness take hold of him — but for every demon which fell, two more clawed forth from the sky, his men collapsing around him as he struck out against endless terrors and shades. And he tried to resist his fears, yet still doubt whispered that this would finally be his last; that the demons which had chased him through life would finally end him here, before he’d had the chance to outweigh his mistakes with good. But then, as his sword-hand began to falter and despair clutched at his chest, the sky shone bright once more; the rift above him sputtered and contracted and finally _closed_ , its last strike of emerald light shattering his foes to ash.

Such mercy could only be the work of the Maker, but when he turned it was Shepard he saw; a dagger in one hand as the other sparked the same green as the scars above them, and he had a thousand questions but when she looked at him there was only one thing he could think of to say.

“You’re alive. Thank the Maker you’re alive.”

She met his gaze only briefly, her attention focused on the injured men at their feet; Cassandra answered instead, regarding Shepard with a wariness he didn’t quite understand. “That mark on her hand can close rifts. She says she does not know how she got it.”

There was something accusatory in her tone; even Shepard seemed to notice it, though her voice remained impassive as she assisted his troops to their feet. “I don’t remember what happened. I know there was a woman, and I was somewhere that… wasn’t here. But apart from that, nothing.” 

A faint frown crossed her features, one she cleared with a shake of her head — yet there remained a hint of _something else_ , struggling just beneath the calm and dispassionate veneer. “What is it, Shepard?”

“It hurt,” she admitted, with a reluctance he’d not seen in her for years.

“You’re injured?”

“No.” It was his turn to frown, the meaning of that simple word just beyond his reach; she moved on before he could grasp it, pragmatism forced to the forefront and muting the uncertainty she’d shown. “It isn’t important; we need to close these rifts. Anything else can be discussed later.”

“Then I will come with you,” he told her, the wish voiced without truly thinking it through, illogical and unnecessary and yet more important to him than any of the other battles he’d faced.

“You’re needed with your soldiers. We’re capable of reaching the Temple alone.” She opened her hand, the green scar on her palm crackling with magical energy, and he knew she was right but it didn’t dislodge the worry which gripped at his chest. “Things will be much harder without the Divine. But this should stop it from getting worse.”

“Shepard…”

He faltered, barely knowing what he felt let alone what to say, that slash of green through her flesh fogging his thoughts and his conscience — a lifeline against demons, but one which came at a price. For who knew what effect such magic would have on her; snarling and spitting and clearly unstable, it was hard to picture any good which could come from such force.

And perhaps it would have been kinder if another now bore that mark, and she had been spared from whatever path they soon faced. Yet he couldn’t help but be glad that it was her who stood before him.

“Maker watch over you,” he said eventually, with a tight clasp of her shoulder and the hope he would see her alive again. “For all our sakes.”


	7. Herald

As Cullen fought on through the valley, the Breach above them stuttered and stabilised, and with it the demons around him fell; turned to ash and scattered away on the breeze, the only remnants of their presence new wounds on battle-hardened skin. But he cared not for his aching muscles or tired eyes; it was Shepard alone who governed his thoughts, her glowing hand and empty expression seared on his mind as he raced back towards their home.

“Where is she?” he asked Cassandra at the gate; her face hardened, and he feared for a brief but terrifying moment it was the last he’d seen of his friend.

“She lost consciousness after stabilising the Breach; the healers are with her currently.” The anxiety in his chest loosened but didn’t abate; he nodded as he began to move past her, but she threw a hand out to stop him. “You should stay away. For now, at least.”

“Why? What happened?”

He expected grave injury, uncertain survival, a battered and broken Shepard beyond his help or his prayers — but what Cassandra spoke of instead was, somehow, even worse. “She says she does not remember what happened at the Temple. But when they found her, she was screaming.” 

His insides turned cold with that single word, because Shepard didn’t _scream_ ; she couldn’t scream, severed from all which governed such reaction, even her response to pain muted and stilled. “That isn’t possible.” Cassandra looked unconvinced, and it felt like an accusation; he sparked up in anger as Shepard no longer could, for she needed _someone_ to defend her on this. “You cannot truly think—”

“I do not believe she had anything to do with the explosion,” she quickly tried to placate him. “But I believe she is hiding something which happened there, and I do not know why. I saw it myself at the Breach; when we got close to it, she changed.” 

“How do you mean, _changed_?”

She opened her mouth, but seemed to think better of what she’d intended to say; instead she shook her head, her shoulders sagging in defeat. “You should ask her yourself when she wakes. But I would still check with the healers to ensure she is… stable, first.”

It took three days for her to come round. Three days of whimpers, and shivers, and fluttering eyes behind closed eyelids, and as much as he could Cullen remained by her side; though their fledgling organisation had never been busier, it was hard to care for anything beyond her survival. And so he carried out his work from her bedside, issuing orders and scrawling terse replies to missives as the healer tended to her wounds; watching on with unease as the elf Solas poured strange magic into the mark on her hand. He knew there was a chance she might never wake; that she’d cede, unobtrusively and insignificantly, into an end she didn’t deserve.

Though that had already happened long ago.

But there was an insuppressible hope that, if she’d _changed_ at the Breach, she might still be changed when she woke; that the old Shepard would be back, and the last few years would fade to a foggy nightmare on her newly-revived mind. She’d be furious with him; she might even try to kill him. But she’d be _her_ again.

Yet when her eyes finally cracked open, there was no more warmth in them than before; her gaze fell on him without judgement nor anger, with her first words those of tactics and war. “Is the Breach sealed?”

“Stabilised,” he reassured her. “We’re still receiving reports of smaller rifts further afield, but you’ve given us the time we need to fight them.” 

“Then there’s still work to do.”

She pushed herself up, swinging her legs out of bed as she did so, but seemed to regret the sudden movement; her eyes fluttered once more as she teetered on the edge of her cot, and he grabbed hold of her shoulders to stop her from falling. “Shepard, you need to rest,” he told her. “We can handle things without you for the time being.”

She forced her eyes open once more, and when she did there was something uncomfortable in the way she met his gaze; searching, and scrutinising, and closer than he really would have liked. “You haven’t been sleeping.”

“I thought you were going to die.” He broke away from her, rubbing his tired eyes if only to stop her from seeing them. “After the Temple, I— they said there was only one survivor. I hoped…”

“I know. The Divine would have been infinitely more useful in this situation. But at least we have a way of closing these rifts.”

His head snapped to face her again, unsure if it were her own opinion or what she believed his would be — and, if the latter, how she could have possibly reached such a conclusion. “That wasn’t what I hoped,” he murmured; she didn’t reply, instead making another attempt to get up - more successfully this time - padding across the room to re-arm herself with the weapons laid across her desk. “Shepard, please stop.” She did, almost immediately, turning towards him with an expectant look. “Can we talk about what happened at the Temple?”

“I can get a report to you in the next hour.”

“No, I need to…” He trailed off with a sigh, raking his fingers through his hair as he struggled to phrase himself gently. “After you closed that rift, you told me it hurt. What did you mean?”

“It isn’t important.”

“But Cassandra said they found you screaming.” She continued to look at him, eyes empty and unblinking, and it felt like prying but he needed to _know_ what had happened. “Shepard, if you felt something—”

“It isn’t important.”

“How can it not be important?!” he snapped, frustrating flaring as he pushed up out of his chair. “Why are you being so evasive - why will you not just _tell_ me?!”

“Because if you think there’s some way to reverse Tranquility you’ll divert resources into a quest which will inevitably be fruitless, and then our cause will suffer,” she told him, impassive as ever in the face of his outburst. “It’s irrelevant, and dangerous, and changes nothing.”

“It changes _everything_!” he argued - and then, struggling for calmness; “please, just tell me - what did you feel?”

She dropped her gaze to the floor, and for a moment he thought she wouldn’t answer him; when she eventually did, she seemed to be doing so against her better judgement. “Anger,” she admitted, almost inaudibly. “It was… uncomfortable. I would rather not face it again.”

Anger was what he’d anticipated — what was only right, after all she’d endured. But the desperate flicker of hope it reignited inside him - the thought of her being _back_ , however furious she might be - would be worth any vengeance brought his way. “In that moment, what did you want? Did you want to be here with us, or did you still want…?”

“I don’t know. I don’t remember anything other than rage.” She shook her head, returning to her task of arming herself as he watched her with a growing sense of dismay. “This is why I would have preferred not to tell you. All it does is complicate matters.”

“But how can you not— we could get you back, Shepard!” he persisted. “Don’t you see that?”

“It took an exorbitant amount of energy for me to feel anything, and it lasted seconds at most. How do you propose making that permanent?”

“I don’t know, I— Solas might know, he seems familiar with these rifts, or— or perhaps…”

He trailed off, desperately grasping for some way to save her as he fought off the truth closing in. “But the woman who came through was not me. At least, not who I’d wanted to be.”

He winced, both hope and fight fading as his shoulders slumped, the friend he’d known consumed by the past once more - and the words he’d tried countless times not to say pushed their way forward again. “I miss you,” he admitted.

“I know.” She placed a hand on his arm, a gesture of comfort which felt hollow with only logic behind it. “I know you still see me as the woman I was when we met. But that’s not who I am anymore. She’s gone, and wishing her back won’t accomplish anything.”

“Then who should I see you as?” he asked, unable to resist adding bitterly; “the _Herald of Andraste_?”

“Pardon?”

“That’s what they’re all calling you. They believe Andraste guided you out of the Fade.”

“Do you?”

He hesitated, unsure quite what he believed. That she had a purpose - that the Maker had chosen her for this task - ought to have been a comforting thought; that she had been saved when countless others had perished, for the skill and determination and commitment to justice which still shone through even now, ought to have reaffirmed the path he had chosen. But believing that meant believing her Tranquility was also the Maker’s will. And he refused to see the purpose in _that_. 

“I don’t know.”

She was quiet for a long time, pensive as she gazed out the window of her little cabin - to the world which awaited her, which needed her, for the mark on her hand and the faith she renewed by her presence. “I doubt divine intervention is at work here,” she said eventually. “But I want to help; I want to be useful. If the title helps, then perhaps we should both use it.”

He opened his mouth to protest, but the words failed to come out, their futility causing them to perish in his throat. For she was right; the old Shepard was long gone, and wishing otherwise had brought him nothing but heartache. And wishing now for a cure, to bring her back and have nothing changed, would only keep bringing him pain.

“I will leave you to rest,” he told her, saluting with his hand on his heart. “Herald.”

“Thank you,” she replied, with a salute of her own back to him. “Commander.”

\---

And so she became the Herald. 

That was how he addressed her now, and somehow that made it easier; with a title, and a purpose, he could imagine more readily her impassiveness as dedication to their cause. Easier still were her new duties out in the field, and though at first he was wary of sending her - the Conclave was proof enough of the danger she could find - her absence from his side allowed him to breathe deeper, at least for a while. Cassandra accompanied her on each trip, and her wariness soon shifted back to protectiveness, as the change she’d witnessed failed to resurface and faded to the backs of their minds.

But with each mission she undertook, the further away she moved from _Shepard_ ; the nobler the deed, the more others forgot a person had once lived underneath. For with him she’d turned from life to existence to a tool, and though they needed to close rifts - needed to find _something_ to bind back together the broken fragments of peace - using her for this seemed asking too much of one who couldn’t truly refuse. She knew he thought this, and when reassurance didn’t work she turned to logic, with reminders that whatever choice she did or didn’t have meant nothing when they fought for the greater good — yet, somehow, hearing that from her was worse.

As for the claims of divinity, he still didn’t know what to believe. It helped their cause to encourage the myth - a fact pointed out by Leliana as well as Shepard - but the faith she garnered from every outlet made even him wonder if it could be true. But why the Maker would have chosen her for this, and not saved her from the Brand, was a question he couldn’t nor wanted to answer — and so he didn’t, turning his focus back to his work whenever doubts crept into view.

Still, the Inquisition moved on, and their duty moved on, and each time she left Haven she arrived back with someone new. A Grey Warden accompanied her from her trip to the Hinterlands; she returned from Orlais with an elven rogue and a Circle mage on each side. The hulking Qunari and his band of mercenaries were the greatest surprise, but her rationale was as flawless as ever, as they would undoubtedly be stronger with The Iron’s Bull’s band amongst their ranks. Soon Haven was packed with both the faithful and the foolhardy, and though devoutness was by no means the default they did all share one belief: Shepard.

It was only time before such presence attracted wider interest, and within two days of each other missives arrived from both the mage and the Templar encampments — and with them, the fighting began. Both he and Cassandra championed the Templars as their way forward; Leliana and Josephine, the mages. Shepard, of course, remained without opinion, which served only to make the situation more fraught; for without that single guiding voice they were directionless, and without a true leader they would remain adrift.

“Herald,” Cullen eventually said, holding as tightly as he could to the fraying edges of his nerves. “You must have some thoughts on this. What do you think we should do?”

“Both options are obviously a trap,” she shrugged. “There’s more risk using magic to seal the Breach, but Templars stand a greater chance of failing. It really comes down to preference, and I don’t have one.”

“Fortunately, I do.”

Cullen’s hand twitched for his sword as an unfamiliar man - a mage, judging by the staff of his back - strode into their War Room, smiling at Shepard as he came to stand next to her. “Herald - and Seeker - good to see you again.”

“This is Dorian,” Shepard explained, to Cullen more than the others. “He’s a mage from Tevinter, but not part of the Venatori. He assisted our party at Redcliffe.”

Such a statement did little to settle Cullen’s nerves; he narrowed his eyes at the man, his interruption just as irksome as the defiance in his posture. “Your preference would be for the mages, I presume.”

“Indeed,” he agreed, his smile tightening as his eyes flickered to the insignia on Cullen’s greaves. “It won’t be easy to get one-over on Alexius — but that’s why I’ll be there.”

With a grunt Cullen turned his attention back to Shepard, with a softness in his tone he rarely called upon anymore. “There is less danger to you personally at Therinfal. I still maintain Templars are our best option.”

“What a fine idea,” Dorian scoffed. “Send a Tranquil to ally with the Templars, and reinforce what every mage is saying: that your Herald is merely a puppet for the Order.”

“Would these be the same mages who have murdered countless Tranquil and used their skulls for blood magic?” Cullen shot back, annoyance transitioning to anger as the macabre reports from Redcliffe flashed anew in his mind. 

“Oh of _course_ , because in between drinking the blood of virgins all Tevinter mages—”

“We discovered at Redcliffe how Oculara are created,” Cassandra interrupted, the hardness of voice not quite revealing the true anger which lay underneath. “By possessing Tranquil mages and then slaughtering them.”

Dorian’s bravado flickered, the colour draining from his face as he looked towards Shepard once more. “I didn’t know that,” he muttered. “I apologise. That is… unacceptable.”

“I doubt that will be Alexius’ plan for me, but the Commander is not unjustified in his concerns.”

Cullen sighed, rubbing the back of his neck as he reconsidered their strategy - against his better judgement, but this time with Shepard rather than the Herald in view. For she would have had an opinion, and no hesitation; had it been her, she’d be halfway across Ferelden already. And though he’d agreed not to see that Shepard in this one - though he’d tried, as best he could, to look to the present instead of the past - still _she_ remained, as stubbornly as she always had, entrenched in the depths of his mind.

“You should go for the mages,” he muttered, against everything he believed in his heart.

“Why?”

“Because that is what you would have done before.”

It occurred to him the last decision he’d influenced had turned her into the Herald, and that perhaps he needed to stop; even she seemed to sense the conflict inside him, a trace of confusion furrowing her brow. “I’m unsure if that’s a valid reason, Commander.”

“It’s as valid a reason as any,” he replied.

She regarded him for a moment longer before nodding, and he did his best to stay resolute even as Dorian grinned in response. “Redcliffe it is,” Dorian said. “Don’t worry, Commander; we shall be back before you know it.”

Had it not been for the untrained soldiers outside the Chantry’s doors, he would have insisted on going with them, to serve from the front with his sword — but Haven needed him far more than she did, which she knew and would fight for if pressed. “And I shall come with you,” Cassandra offered in his stead. “You will need a Seeker against whatever magic we face.”

Shepard nodded again, just as dispassionately as the first time. “I will see who else wishes to join us. We can set off tomorrow morning.”

She turned to leave then, with Dorian right beside her, and a sudden quickening of Cullen’s heart forced him to speak ahead of his mind. “Be careful, Herald,” he called after her. “Do not forget you are walking into a trap.”

“I haven’t, Commander,” she replied, not looking back as the door closed behind her.

“Keep an eye on that one,” he muttered to Cassandra. “He may not have known about the Oculara, but I am still hesitant to trust any mage from Tevinter.”

“In truth, I do not think we have to worry about Dorian,” she told him, and he didn’t know what the mage had done to win her trust but it placated him for now. “But do not fear, Cullen; she will be safe with me.”


End file.
